CW plans for a new Robin Hood series

The network that successfully launched Arrow this year hopes to add another series based on the folk hero who inspired DC Comics’ Green Arrow: Robin Hood. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Sherwood will focus on a young noblewoman who joins Robin Hood and his Merry Men in an effort to rescue her serf boyfriend being held captive by Normans.

Set in 1072, the pilot is written by Tze Chun, writer and director of Children of Invention and the upcoming Eye of Winter.

The CW also has projects based on Alice In Wonderland, Sleepy Hollow and even Wonder Woman in the works in an effort to continue building up their stable of dramatic action offerings. The network will decide how to move forward after getting a look at Chun’s finished script.

Well there's nothing like doing the upteenth re-imagining of something.

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When you're dealing with a centuries-old figure of legend like Robin Hood, a story we only remember because countless writers over more than a millennium have continually reimagined and reinvented it, it's pretty silly to talk about that like it's a bad thing. Our "standard" perception of the Robin Hood story, with characters like the Sheriff of Nottingham and Alan-a-Dale and so on, is itself a later reimagining of the old legends. Reinventing old stories is what keeps them alive and engaging to generation after generation.

Well there's nothing like doing the upteenth re-imagining of something.

Click to expand...

When you're dealing with a centuries-old figure of legend like Robin Hood, a story we only remember because countless writers over more than a millennium have continually reimagined and reinvented it, it's pretty silly to talk about that like it's a bad thing. Our "standard" perception of the Robin Hood story, with characters like the Sheriff of Nottingham and Alan-a-Dale and so on, is itself a later reimagining of the old legends. Reinventing old stories is what keeps them alive and engaging to generation after generation.

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Whilst this is true, I can't imagine anything approaching the quality of HTV's brilliant Robin of Sherwood (I think it was just called Robin Hood in the US) for me THE definitive version...

Whilst this is true, I can't imagine anything approaching the quality of HTV's brilliant Robin of Sherwood (I think it was just called Robin Hood in the US) for me THE definitive version...

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Well, by Sturgeon's Law, most examples of any genre or story will be bad, but the corollary is that a few will be good. So that means if we want a second really good Robin Hood show, then it's good that people keep trying to make them, since eventually we're bound to get one, even if we have to sift through a few bad or mediocre ones to reach it.

In my experience, there can be more than one definitive version of a good thing. For a long time, the '90s FOX Spider-Man cartoon was the definitive Spidey series, superior to anything before or since. Then Greg Weisman's The Spectacular Spider-Man came along and blew it out of the water. If people had stopped making Spidey shows after the first really good one, then we wouldn't have gotten the even better one. (True, we're currently saddled with a significantly inferior one, Ultimate Spider-Man, but there are bound to be others in the future and eventually we'll get another really good one.)

That's 120 years earlier than the classic version. Can't use Prince John and Richard Lionheart, then, which was half the point of the story (at least in the Flynn film). At least it falls after the Norman conquest. William himself was still king at that point.

I am sure someone with a better memory than me can explain how there never has been a consistent time frame for the Robin Hood legend. The ballads were written at different times and the characters were added from different sources in later telling. The historical Richard the Lionhearted rarely has any influence on the time frame of these stories.

The most interesting thing about this announcement is how well CW sees Arrow doing. Obviously this would be a very different show. But clearly the timing of this is based on Arrow's success. In these days of fragmented audiences it hard to tell what is considered a true success anymore.

^Exactly. The "classic" version, as I said above, is not the original version. It wasn't until the 16th century that Robin Hood started to be portrayed as a nobleman and partisan of Richard the Lionhearted. Before that, he was portrayed as a commoner and not tied to that specific historical period.

^Exactly. The "classic" version, as I said above, is not the original version. It wasn't until the 16th century that Robin Hood started to be portrayed as a nobleman and partisan of Richard the Lionhearted. Before that, he was portrayed as a commoner and not tied to that specific historical period.

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Yeah, but the 16th century version is the one we all grew up with. There's a reason why Ridley Scott's 2010 version bombed so hard. It was a pretty good movie in its own right, but it was not "Robin Hood".

As Ebert said it: “Robin Hood” is a high-tech and well made violent action picture using the name of Robin Hood for no better reason than that it's an established brand not protected by copyright.

Similarly to Robin Hood, the legend of King Arthur also doesn't have a definitive version. Starz tried to "reboot" it with that kid from Twilight, and look how that worked out for them. I gave it a shot, and it was absolutely terrible. Didn't even finish the pilot.

Seven years earlier Antoine Fuqua tried the same with his "gritty and realistic" version. The result - empty theaters. Mine was packed though, but they were literally giving away thousands of tickets for free (some T-Mobile promotional stunt).

But then, CW did manage to successfully pervert the story of Superman into an angsty teen drama which became a guilty pleasure for many of Supes' fans (including me, for a time).

They pulled it off again recently with Arrow, but that one was a low-tier superhero to begin with, thus a bad example.

I might give this new Robin a chance too, but I got a bad feeling about it.

There was a pretty good European/Canadian-produced Robin Hood movie that came out around the same time as the Kevin Costner movie, was thoroughly overshadowed by it (only airing on TV in the US), and was vastly superior to it. It starred Patrick Bergin, Uma Thurman, and Jurgen Prochnow, and it was also focused on Saxon vs. Norman, leaving out characters like the Sheriff, Guy, and King Richard, and instead building on the earlier versions of the legend.

Well there's nothing like doing the upteenth re-imagining of something.

Click to expand...

When you're dealing with a centuries-old figure of legend like Robin Hood, a story we only remember because countless writers over more than a millennium have continually reimagined and reinvented it, it's pretty silly to talk about that like it's a bad thing. Our "standard" perception of the Robin Hood story, with characters like the Sheriff of Nottingham and Alan-a-Dale and so on, is itself a later reimagining of the old legends. Reinventing old stories is what keeps them alive and engaging to generation after generation.

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Yes but the last Robin Hood TV show only ended something like 3.5 years ago.

I've never understood the idea that there should be a long gap between different versions of a thing. Maybe because I grew up with Filmation's Batman and Hanna-Barbera's Superfriends on the air at the same time, alongside Adam West and George Reeves reruns. I'm used to different incarnations of a thing coexisting. And it's happened a lot since then, especially in recent decades, with different animated versions of DC and Marvel heroes coming and going with only a couple of years between them at most, and of course coming out alongside the different continuities of the movies and the comics.

There are so many different (and contradictory) legends behind both Robin Hood and Arthur that there is no such thing as the "definitive" version of either. Every version out there is one person's interpretation.

The goal behind a re-envisioning shouldn't be to simply make a new film/series, but to tell a certain story or moral about that character. If the CW wants to make a series about Robin Hood, great. Just have a reason for doing it.

I was one of those who watched Smallville back on the WB, but after around season 5 or so it started to wear a little thin. It stopped being about telling the story of Clark growing up and coming to terms with his heritage, and started being about the CW trying to desperately cling to ratings using an aging tentpole.

I was one of those who watched Smallville back on the WB, but after around season 5 or so it started to wear a little thin. It stopped being about telling the story of Clark growing up and coming to terms with his heritage, and started being about the CW trying to desperately cling to ratings using an aging tentpole.

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But then when the original showrunners left after season 7 and their subordinates took over in season 8, it was revitalized, and for the first time really started being about Clark embracing and working toward his heroic destiny, rather than avoiding it as he'd spent the previous 7 seasons doing. And in season 8-9, it was a good show again. Although it kinda went off the rails again in season 10.